If Only We Could Sleep
by Kamui Senketsu
Summary: "I'm so tired." And this was true, but just a little more... All that Naruto had to do was go on a little more, and then would come sleep. Or so it had seemed... Warning: This will be a strange one... with character death, dark themes, and sadness all around. But, it'll be more than that as well. But you'll have to read it to find out. AU. ON HOLD.
1. If Only She Could Sleep

**Heyo, got some sadness to punch you in the chest. Here ya go.**

 **I don't own Naruto.**

* * *

She was tired.

She couldn't go on anymore. She couldn't do it.

She went back like they asked. She slaughtered the man on the moon, she hunted down every one of those white skinned horned freaks and she erased them.

Now that future would never come about. The only thing to worry about was the mad man that eluded death, waiting. But he could be handled by the ones born to fight him. That despicable plant monster could be handled just the same. She didn't have to do it anymore. She could lay down here and just sleep and know that the people who had not yet been born, would be the ones to save the world. They would never know about the man on the moon. Never know about the people who harvested that forbidden fruit high above the clouds. That clan was gone. She'd come back, her sole purpose to kill them, the ones truly capable of destroying the shinobi world.

She'd done that. She'd done it and she just wanted to rest.

But those ghosts, the same ones who followed her everywhere, still they whispered to her.

"It's over…" She rasped, right cheek resting in the dirt.

The moon was high, the violet sky quiet and cloudy during the twilight as she lay, battered and bloody in a clearing surrounded by trees. Well, the clearing had become a crater when she'd crashed into it, lit up with powerful golden chakra that kept her from incinerating as she fell from the very sky above. She'd fallen a long way, much like a meteorite, and honestly even being who she was, she was surprised to have still been breathing.

"It's over." She said again.

"It's not." The pink ghost huffed. "He's still here. If you don't do something, he'll cast Infinite Tsukuyomi."

She blinked, the taste of copper thick in her mouth, staining her teeth as she bared them in something akin to a grin.

"I got who mattered." She muttered, red oozing through her teeth. "He's not gonna win. He didn't before."

"Why would you even let the war happen?" The silver ghost chimed in, a lazy drawl. "You're here now. Better to just take care of it. You've already altered things, you have to make sure you've altered them for the best."

"I'm tired." She whined, eyes blurring. "I want to sleep. That's all I want. Can I have it, _please_?"

"Stop complaining." The black ghost intoned. "Get up. It isn't over yet."

She wanted to shake her head but she felt faint, and the air was cold. She knew if she just went to sleep, that she'd never have to worry about being cold, or about feeling faint, or about the old mad man with selfish dreams.

He wasn't her problem. He could be defeated if they tried hard enough.

"Don't you let it happen." The pink ghost hissed. "Get up. It was hard before, you don't know for sure the people here will win. Before he lost because he was betrayed, not because of anything that the alliance did."

"Get rid of him." The silver one bargained. "Get rid of that man, and then you can sleep."

"The plant thing too." The black ghost reminded. "Don't let him awaken his mother. You took care of the other ones, but there's still her. Do not let her wake up."

Her eyelids grew heavier, and the exhausted tears welling up spilled down her bruised and bloodied face, parting a path through the grime as a wretched sob tore from somewhere deep inside her.

"I'm so tired. I'm _tired_." She whimpered.

"Just a little more." The pink ghost soothed, kneeling at her side. "A little more and you can sleep."

"So get up." The silver one said, eyes following the print in his little orange book. "Just a little more."

"Just a little more." The black one promised, nodding once.

She sobbed as her arms moved slowly, weighed down by invisible boulders, nails sinking into the earth as she pushed herself up, trembling.

Her tears speckled the earth, and the copper in her mouth fell to join them. Her sobs broke into a coughing fit, rattling her scorched lungs.

"Just a little more." Her ghosts whispered. "Come on. Just a little more, Naruto."

Weak, bloodied, and tired deep in her bones, Naruto stood up.

She shambled out of her crater, the place that had cradled her, the place she had been willing to let lull her into eternal slumber. The voices of her ghosts urged her on with promises of rest. But first she had to go.

"Keep going." The pink ghost said when she stumbled.

So she shambled on.

"Don't stop." The silver one murmured when she collapsed.

So she got up again.

"Keep walking." The black one whispered when she coughed up blood.

And she did.

With every step she lost a little bit to her wounds, but she kept going, a near corpse as she dragged herself on.

"Just a little more." She found herself murmuring, when her ghosts returned to the memories inside of her.

She could barely see through the tears, and could smell nothing but her own blood.

Naruto was so very tired, but it wasn't quite done. When she was done, she'd dig her own hole and lay in it. She didn't care if she wasn't covered. She would lay in it, and she would sleep.

But not yet.

"Just a little more."


	2. Two Broken Things

**Ah, I dunno what this is. I guess I didn't want it to end for Naruto.**

* * *

Sakumo Hatake was many things.

He was a man. A father. A comrade. A shinobi. A failure... And broken.

Completely and irreversibly broken. He had been forsaken. Not in a physical sense, but in an emotional sense. His comrades and the people... the villagers that he had lived to protect… they shunned him. They whispered the poison that was his name back and forth amongst themselves, they sneered, or shook their heads at how pitiful he had become. And pitiful he was indeed. His son, just five years old… a genius in his own right could even see it. He saw Sakumo's misery. It was in the way that Sakumo's shoulders no longer held strong, but how they were perpetually slumped with an invisible burden. He saw it in the smudges of black beneath his father's eyes from lack of sleep. He saw it in the abyss that Sakumo's dark gray eyes had become. They were deep in a new sense in recent days.

They were pools of infinite sadness, self hatred, and shame.

Sakumo's skills as a shinobi had suffered from the depression that clung to him. He was no longer revered as the White Fang of Konoha, the living legend that had gone toe to toe with Hanzo the Salamander for days on end. Instead, he was the failure that had chosen to save his comrades instead of completing his mission as expected of him. His comrades had lived, but the village suffered a blow due to his decision. As a result, he had stopped carrying his White Chakra Saber, feeling undeserving to use it. He was no longer a shinobi worth carrying such a tool. He was no longer a shinobi worth the name he had carried with pride.

One could argue that Sakumo had only done what Konoha taught its shinobi to do. He had valued the lives of his fellow ninja and protected them as he had the ability to, but that was overlooked. He had failed a mission too important, and the ones he had saved held no thanks for him.

They shunned him as well.

Sakumo could see the sympathy in the Hokage's brown eyes whenever the man's wise gaze fell upon his defeated form, but there was nothing either of them could do. The damage had been done, and there was no way for Sakumo to redeem himself.

And so he roamed.

Others allowed him this one vice. He roamed outside the gates of the village at any time he felt the need to breathe again. He walked and walked until he felt he had been gone long enough and needed to return.

As usual, he walked for hours on end before some distant part of him reminded him that he needed to return home, to the son that he had let down more than anyone else.

It was dark out, well past ten o'clock at night, and Sakumo had wandered off quite far. With his less than determined stride, it would take him about two hours to get back to the village.

Sakumo looked up at the dark blue blanket of stars above, trying to discern a more accurate perception of the time. Trees and their night darkened leaves surrounded him, obscuring his vision.

He took a few steps back, but instead of focusing on the stars beyond the twisting branching, he peered into them.

"What in the…" His voice trailed off, slightly hoarse from disuse, quiet and cautious.

There was something in the branches.

But no. It was not a something but a who.

A someone.

And that someone was a little girl. It was too dark to tell what she looked like or what color her hair was, but Sakumo could at least gather that she was quite young due to her size. That or just extremely short. She appeared to be wearing only a dark shirt that was in utter tatters, the sleeves long and falling past her hands, hiding them. Her hair was long, a tangled mass that was ensnared painfully in the branches she hung from like some twisted ornament.

She was still in the way that only near death could make possible, but when Sakumo stretched his keen senses for the first time in quite some time, he heard her ragged and faint breathing. His nose scented old blood, and chard flesh. The smell of battle.

Without thinking, he channeled chakra into his feet and ran up the length of the tree bark. He reached her in a matter of seconds. Sticking to the side of the tree, he reached out with gentle hands. He didn't call to her, because he knew her consciousness was in a shaky place. Had he walked away, none the wiser to her presence, she would've been dead before midnight.

He had nothing sharp to cut her down with, as some part of him had made him leave his weapons behind, in case he stumbled across someone who was willing to kill him and therefore end his suffering.

So, Sakumo had to get the girl down by hand. And since he was closer to her he could gather that she was indeed a girl, and indeed very young. Probably around his son's age. And five was much too young to be out in the middle of the forest neck deep in death, left to die in the cold all alone.

The Hatake carefully yet swiftly untangled the girl's hair from the branches it was twisted around. He scented more fresh blood as he did so, knowing that there were tears around her scalp from the stress put there as her full weight pulled the long tresses sprouting from it. Her body was covered in little scratches healed to various degrees, and Sakumo could tell that she had fallen. She'd fallen through the branches from above, and they had injured her even more before her hair had gotten snagged and she lost consciousness, left to hang until she expired.

 _'But fallen from where?'_ He wondered, unwrapping a particularly stubborn lock from around a long twig. _'Where did this child come from?'_

Finally, after a long while he freed her, quickly grasping the little one as freefall took her and cradling her to his chest. He was alarmed at what he found.

The right sleeve of her tattered shirt was empty. Most of her arm was missing. Sakumo hopped down from the tree, landing with silent grace that had been ingrained in him long ago. He held her with his right arm, and she was slumped against his chest.

Using his left, he rolled up her sleeve, eyes widening at what he saw. From the elbow down, as he knew her arm was gone. But it wasn't an infected bloodied stump. No, the injury appeared to be old yet healed, and there were bits of a white substance clinging to it, the remains of some odd prosthetic. He ran his fingers over the white substance gently, shivering because it felt like human flesh.

"Just who are you?" He whispered.

The Hatake rolled her sleeve back over her stump, and then he turned towards his village and ran.

He was still swift, a force to be reckoned with, but nowhere near what he had been, so it would still take him a while to get to the village.

He traveled in a blur, a silver ghost in the night, and for a moment, he felt his beaten bundle stir.

Her eyes didn't open but she spoke. She said something in a little raspy voice that was almost a whisper, a pitiful string of sounds that would have been missed by anyone else but someone with his senses. And what she said… no matter how quietly, it resonated deafeningly loud in the deepest part of his soul. And Sakumo knew. He knew that he had stumbled across a kindred spirit.

"I want to die."

* * *

 **Sorry Naruto, doesn't look like you found your peaceful sleep. :(**


	3. Who Are You

**I don't own Naruto.**

* * *

She was aware before her eyes had opened or her body moved.

She recognized the feeling of a breathing mask over her mouth and nose, the IV in her only arm, and the starchy sheets that were draped over her lower half as she rested in a bed that she would have never owned.

She heard the beeping of a heart monitor, strong and steady, and her breathing was unhurried, relaxed.

Naruto Uzumaki was in a hospital, of this she was certain. Her eyes opened slowly, and she saw light. She had been saved.

She burst into tears.

* * *

Naruto hadn't moved.

She didn't know how long she'd been awake, nor how long she'd been asleep before awakening. It didn't seem like decades though, because Naruto knew quite well what those felt like.

Naruto had outlived all of her loved ones. She hadn't been the last person left on earth in her time, but she'd been the last Konoha ninja. The last ninja period. And she had been incredibly old when she had managed to "save the world" from those freaks. The Ōtsutsuki clan. It hadn't stopped with the invasion of Momoshiki and his lackey in the form of a father. Once they were defeated, it only attracted more, and it had only been a matter of time before they took over. Naruto would admit that the memories had gotten scrambled in her head, it had been so long ago, but she did remember their request. Their, _them_ being her team. "If you can fix it, fix it."

And Naruto had. She lived longer than anyone should ever have to simply because they had no other choice until something was done. She cleansed the world of the monsters with horns, that wretched clan.

But the victory was empty.

There was no more Konoha, no more family, no more comrades. No more anything. But because Naruto had been so old, she'd known things. Learned things over the decades. So with the urgings of the three ghosts that she could never let go of… the ones that lived in her brain after years of being gone from her life… she'd gone back.

Naruto had gone back in time, and did what was necessary to insure that the future she had seen never came about. There was no more Ōtsutsuki clan. She'd taken care of them right away, and fallen from above after she was done. But still, the ghosts wouldn't let Naruto sleep.

No matter how hard she cried, how profusely she bled, how steadily without her say she inched towards eternal slumber… the ghosts urged her on. "Madara" they said. "Zetsu" they reminded.

And so Naruto had gotten up again, and she left the crater that would have been her grave from when she'd fallen from the clouds.

Naruto hunted down the plant man first, and even near death he was no match for her. And then she found Madara, a feeble old man who only had hatred going for him. Though he had managed to destroy the prosthetic Naruto had in the stead of her right arm, he was no longer alive at the end of their skirmish.

Finally, the ghosts told her that it was okay to sleep. More relieved than she had been in a pitifully long time, Naruto set out to a place that was quiet. Somewhere that she could rest and stay asleep. Not wanting to risk someone stumbling across her body and becoming too curious, she used a jutsu that she had created all on her own during her many previous years as an old vagabond plotting the demise of her alien adversaries. Naruto had transformed herself into a small child.

She was certain no one would have too many questions about a dead child. Being in the time frame she was in, she knew there was absolutely nothing uncommon about dead children, however tragic that was.

So she'd changed, physically and completely into a young girl, and then she'd flown off in search of a suitable grave, using the gift of flight granted by her Six Paths Sage mode.

But even Naruto had a limit.

She lost consciousness without any warning, and fell, hair caught in a cluster of branches in a tree apart of a large and strangely familiar forest.

Naruto had been in and out of consciousness quite a bit, but she decided that a tree was just as good as anything else.

She had been beyond tired. And so she closed her eyes and gave up.

But nothing was that simple. Not for Naruto. It never was. She remembered feeling someone near, and then they were moving, the night blurring past them.

Naruto informed the person of her one true desire, and then she went back towards the peaceful abyss that had been beckoning her for years.

* * *

But Naruto had woken up again.

The abyss was nowhere in sight. She felt healthy again, if a little malnourished, in a hospital room, and very much alive.

It wasn't fair.

"You promised." Naruto whispered, more tears welling up in her eyes. "You _promised_ that if I did what you said, that I could sleep."

The ghosts were ever present in her mind, but they didn't show themselves. They didn't speak. All Naruto could do was cry.

The tears eventually ran their course, and Naruto calmed down, reminding herself that this was not the first time things didn't go as planned, and with her luck nor would it be the last.

Honestly, Naruto could off herself right now, but she ran the risk of alerting the staff of whatever facility she was in rushing in to save her. Besides, she didn't want to go out like that.

Now that the blonde was calmer, she told herself that she could thank those responsible for saving her, and then when all was said and done, she could leave quietly to find a place where she could sleep.

Naruto didn't want anyone to have to clean up after her when she did manage to get her much desired sleep, so she would just bide her time.

The blonde sat up, using her only remaining hand to pull the breathing mask off of her face and set it aside. Her stump still had traces of her old prosthetic clinging to it, but she wasn't concerned about that. She plucked the IV from her flesh without so much as a twitch, and then she swung her legs over the side of the bed she was in, so that her little feet dangled above the floor.

Naruto wasn't as unfamiliar with being so small as one would think, had they known how old she truly was. This was because Naruto's jutsu was very special. She could essentially rewind or fast forward her own age. It was a full transformation each time, and there was no limit to how many times she could do this. She could even change her own gender, a complete and fully anatomically correct change.

Truthfully, Naruto had been doing so for so long, that she could no longer remember whether she had been born a female, or born a male. It was another one of the things in her head that had become scrambled with both insanity and age. But anyway, when she changed into a boy or a man, she was a boy or a man. When she was a girl or a woman, she was a girl or a woman.

Naruto was Naruto, and she could at least remember that.

The little blonde slid off the bed and landed a little shakily on the floor, her legs trembling with disuse. Wide blue eyes took in the soft yellow walls of the hospital room she was in, the white polished floors, and the large window overlooking a grand and prosperous village beyond it.

Naruto couldn't tell you how she immediately recognized the architecture, even if it wasn't as updated as it had been in her own time. She just… she just _knew._

"No…" Naruto breathed, taking a step towards the window. "No it _can't be…!_ "

She rushed over, ignoring the way her knees popped and protested at the abuse. Naruto stood on her tiptoes, unlatching the lock on the window and sliding it open, shoving her head out and looking about with eyes that steadily filmed over with manic pain.

Her eyes drank in the village, and the people milling about below the afternoon sky, enjoying the lazy rays of the sun. She recognized the uniform on the shinobi that could be spotted every so often among the crowds.

The dark blue clothing, the forest green vest, the red spiral emblazoned on their backs…!

And then-

 _A red moonless sky, a deep barren trench in the place of people, their laughter, their hope, their_ lives. _No shinobi, no villagers, no family. No_ anything. _Death. Destruction. Loneliness. **Failure.**_

"NO!"

Naruto didn't know what happened, but suddenly she wasn't hanging halfway out of the second floor window of Konoha's Hospital and omigodomigodomigodomigodomigod she was back and they were alive and-

She was being crushed against someone's chest, they were on their knees, their arms wrapped around her and rocking them both back and forth.

Naruto was limp in the stranger's grasp, coming back to herself enough to scent the forest after rain, the smell of a thunderstorm. It was a strangely appealing scent, and she got the feeling that someone associated it with 'home'.

The way this person held her, Naruto felt as if they knew what it meant to be someone's home, someone that others depended on.

 _'Calm.'_ She told herself. _'That's there. That's gone, and you're here.'_

The blonde took in a shuddering breath, and then her ears were freed of the dead silence in her memories, the sound of nothingness after everything had been ripped away.

She could hear the stranger, whispering, assuring and promising.

"You're okay." They said. "Wherever you were, you're not there anymore, and you're okay."

Naruto pulled back slightly, and the stranger allowed her to. She looked up into the stranger's face, and she saw features before her that belonged to someone in her own time that had been long dead.

 _'Sensei…'_

The silver ghost leaned over the stranger's shoulder from behind, peering at Naruto, close enough to touch.

"I'm here." The silver ghost said.

As usual, his face was covered. It was right beside the stranger's, and Naruto was facing them both.

"B-but…" The blonde stuttered.

Naruto's ghost smiled, she could tell because of the way his eyes arched closed.

"Tread carefully Naruto." He warned good naturedly. "I'm here. Right here."

Blue eyes traveled between the two dark gray pair that held a startling resemblance. The stranger looked to his side, bare nose brushing the masked one of Naruto's silver ghost.

"Maa, a little close there, ne?" The ghost chuckled, leaning back slightly and poking the stranger in the nose.

After a long moment, the strangers brows furrowed, looking back to Naruto in confusion. The blonde blinked.

"What are you looking at?" The stranger asked her, in a voice that was most definitely not the same as her ghost's.

Come to think of it, the stranger looked like Naruto's dear friend, but he was without a doubt his own person. The stranger's silver hair was much longer, framing a pale face that had subtle hints of age and stress, pulled into a spiking ponytail at the nape of his neck.

"Who are you?" Naruto asked, tiny hand unclenching from the fabric of the stranger's shirt. When had she latched onto him?

The stranger blinked, seeming to be surprised. But then he just sat back, releasing the little blonde from his hold.

"My name is Sakumo." He said, eyeing her in a way that she thought should make her uncomfortable. He had a perceptive gaze, and Naruto wasn't sure exactly what he was perceiving, but it was probably of no consequence. It was only a matter of time before she got her much deserved sleep, after all.

"Sakumo Hatake."

The silver ghost stood up to his full height, and Naruto's eyes fled to him. He simply waved her away, reaching into his vest and pulling out his favorite little book.

His dark eyes were sad in a nostalgic sort of way, but also quietly loving. He flipped his book open, gaze already beginning to trail across the text before it.

"You're in good hands Naruto." Her ghost murmured.

Naruto watched him turn towards the door, lifting his hand over his shoulder for a lazy wave. His form faded away, leaving the blonde alone with the stranger.

The newly revealed Sakumo glanced to where Naruto was looking, but her ghost was already gone, so he looked back at her with that same shrewd gaze, cocking his head to the side slightly.

"What's your name?" Sakumo asked gently.

Naruto looked back at him, slouching and folding her legs beneath her more comfortably on the floor.

"My name is Naruto." The blonde admitted. "Were you the one that saved me?"

No use beating around the bush. She was by no means a little girl and honestly saw no reason to behave as if she was. Now that she had gotten ahold of herself somewhat, the disheveled haze that had been filmed over her mind for who knows how long peeled back slightly. She still desired nothing more than peaceful sleep for her tired soul, but she wasn't so far gone that she couldn't behave like a normal person.

Sakumo looked at her again with that studying gaze, and then the side of his mouth hitched up ever so slightly.

"Yes, that was me." He said. "I'm glad to see you're alright, Naruto-chan. You were in very bad shape when I found you. Actually, you've only been here for a week, the doctor says that your recovery is moving oddly fast."

"Oh yeah, I've always healed fast." The blonde explained. "I'm just not so good at growing back certain things."

She lifted her stump, waving it around slightly with a small smirk. Sakumo gaped, obviously not expecting such blatant gallows humor to have come from her mouth.

Naruto cocked her head to the side, blinking her wide eyes.

"Your appearance sweetheart." Her pink ghost reminded, poking the blonde in the side before leaving again to do whatever it is pink ghosts did when they weren't needed.

"Hm?" Naruto hummed, and then she paused. "Oh, right."

Her black ghost snorted under his breath, suddenly sitting on the hospital bed that she had vacated, watching the happenings with two different eyes.

Ignoring him because he was always that way, Naruto said, "That stuff probably seems odd coming from me. I apologize, it's been a long time since I've interacted with others in a… friendly manner."

The last person she remembered interacting with was the Madara Uchiha of the timeframe she currently found herself in, and the expression on his severed head would be burned into her retinas until her own imminent demise.

"You… are a very strange child." Sakumo finally settled on.

"Well of course you might think so." Naruto said honestly. "That's because I'm not a child. Though it was very kind of you to save me anyway. And I'll also have to thank you for comforting me."

"Think, Naruto." The black ghost hissed. "Why don't you ever _think?_ "

Naruto absentmindedly waved the black ghost away, and with a huff he dispersed.

The blonde watched as Sakumo was on his feet and across the room in a nanosecond, back to the door.

"What do you mean you're not a child?" He demanded quietly, eyes narrowing.

Instead of answering, Naruto slowly got on her knees, her flesh rippling with power, bones detaching beneath her skin and lengthening. She leaned forward on her one hand and her knees, swelling like a balloon. Her hair fell forward to hide the gruesome sight, englogating and spilling from her skull in a shimmering gold flood. Her form distended so far and so quickly that it seemed as if she may pop, but then her skin snapped in tight, compacting against her skeleton.

"What are yo-"

When Naruto slowly stood to her full height, she was a startling five foot ten, and very much not a child. It all happened in a matter of seconds. One moment she was perhaps around five years old, and the next, perhaps in her mid twenties.

"Who are you?" Sakumo asked, his tone dangerously low.

"I told you." The woman returned, blinking. "I'm Naruto."

Sakumo stared.

Naruto stared back.

She looked down when she noticed an odd breeze. Hm. She seemed to be quite naked. After several long beats, she blinked.

"Oops."

Her silver ghost placed his chin on her shoulder from behind, shaking his head ever so slightly.

"Didn't I tell you to tread carefully?"

* * *

 **I dunno, I feel like it should've been more dramatic. But then again, I'm trying something a little different with this story. It's not all deep dark sadness and violence.**


	4. A Strange One

**I don't own Naruto**

* * *

Maybe in an earlier stage of Naruto's life, he would have reacted more accordingly to being seen naked by a man he didn't know when he was a she. And maybe he would have reacted more accordingly to the Anbu swarming into the hospital room after Sakumo flared his chakra to notify them that they were needed.

When Naruto had been seized, he'd still been in his woman form, quite nude, with the scraps of the child sized hospital scrubs she'd been wearing still laying pitifully at her feet. The Anbu "subdued" Naruto, though the blonde simply just put forth absolutely no effort to get free. He had resigned himself to whatever process he was going to face after being taken away, Sakumo's eyes watching the scene play out with an unreadable expression.

The blonde was by no means going to allow himself to be tortured, but if his situation proved to be too irritating, he'd free himself to find a place to lie down and sleep. He knew if he was patient enough though, that things would let up. And despite the old but common misconception, the blonde could be very patient.

Naruto, still in his male form, was sitting alone in a stone cell with a single steel bolted door and a small window large enough for someone to look into with just their eyes being visible.

The room was incredibly cold, and though Naruto was free of physical restraints, there were chakra suppressing seals inscribed into the surrounding box-like room. Of course the seals barely touched upon the abyss that held his power, but Naruto was old.

He would much rather civilly solve his problems at this point. The world no longer required a ruthless savior, so he was biding his time.

The blonde appeared to be a young man in his mid twenties, with his hair cropped short to his skull, and he had been given more scrubs to wear. They were a plain white, and his feet were bare.

Three different people had been in his cell so far, trying to crack him with mental games. None of their efforts were fruitful.

 _"Where are you from?"_ They wanted to know.

 _"A place long gone."_ He answered truthfully.

 _"What is your objective?"_ They demanded.

 _"To sleep."_ He deadpanned.

 _"Why are you in Konoha?"_ They tried again.

 _"Perhaps you should ask Sakumo-san?"_ He mused.

The blonde man had sent them all packing, quite annoyed by his passive responses. Of course no one could tell that Naruto was behaving differently from when he first arrived, but Sakumo would be able to, as he had interacted with Naruto more, and seen the other side to him.

Sometimes Naruto was more mentally "there" than he ever wanted to be. He hated those times, because it was those times when his own circumstances weighed more heavily on his irreversibly broken being. Those were the times when the ghosts didn't talk to him much, when he couldn't hide behind their fabricated protection, left quiet and darkly thoughtful.

He hated it when his brain forced him to be that way, when it brought on musings pertaining to who he was and what he'd become. If his shattered remains could even be considered a person and not just some wounded animal that was better off being put down.

But it was this miserable state of mind, that allowed Naruto to gather his thoughts a little better. This state of mind that concluded long ago that he had come to be made up of three modes.

His current one, quite lucid, dark, and tame. Another where he seemed to have a pleasant film over his brain. His ghosts talked to him more when he was like that, and he would admit to clinging to their company. But it was a state that could be lifted by the atmosphere he was in at any given moment.

Actually, they all were. Naruto had no true control over how he behaved, and he knew this. Hated it, but knew that it was how it was, and how it would be until he was no more.

But anyways, Naruto's last state was when he was drowning in his own memories and the despair they brought. When his thoughts jumbled together and bombarded him, somehow always leading to the ultimate conclusion that he wanted to die. When he was like that, all he wanted was nothingness, to sleep and be in peace. His ghosts tended to be more verbally ruthless in that state, and they were usually the ones to get him moving again if he was crippled by it and there was something to be done.

The last state was understandably Naruto's least favorite state of mind, and it was absolutely out of the blonde's control. Even more so than his other modes. Anything could set it off, be it a distant scent or the way silence sounded in a certain area.

Silence often triggered Naruto's states. When there was silence, it ate away at him. His ghosts helped to keep it at bay, from creeping into him and leaving an absent minded shell. But many times his own thoughts had been too loud for him to hear his ghosts, even if they were right beside him.

When his thoughts blared in his head all at once, that was when his madness was the most unbearable.

"But nothing is unbearable at this immediate moment." The "young" man murmured, staring at the far wall and the imposing door centered at it. "Except maybe the monotony."

No matter how old Naruto got, he couldn't stand boredom.

As if to save him from his lifelong nemesis, the door to his cell groaned as it was pushed open, previously kept closed by invisible seals. Leaning against the wall across from the door, the blonde man stared at the silver haired one studying him from the doorway.

Naruto had known he would come. It was why the blonde had changed into his male form, because he knew. He knew Sakumo would have been uncomfortable with talking to a young girl locked up in a cell. And Naruto didn't want to inconvenience Sakumo in any way.

He had saved him after all. And comforted him.

Naruto knew if he had just been patient enough, they, (the interrogators) would bring in Sakumo, the one that he had been the most open with in the first place, who had called for the Anbu after the blonde revealed that he was no mere child.

Naruto was a little surprised that they hadn't tried to physically torture him yet, but he was glad they had decided to bring Sakumo in first. Naruto was quite tired of hurting others.

"I knew you'd come." Naruto spoke up, studying the other man unblinkingly.

Sakumo's head tilted slightly, those keen dark eyes piercing the huddled form of the "younger" man.

"Your demeanor is quite different." The Hatake observed, stepping fully into the room, allowing the door to shut behind him.

"My mind is quite clear." Naruto admitted.

The Hatake paused, but not for long. His lips pursed and Naruto thought he should feel some type of way about the way he was being regarded.

"Who are you?" Sakumo flat out asked. "What are you?"

Naruto finally blinked.

"I am Naruto." The blonde returned honestly. "And I am a man."

"Not a child? Not a woman?" Sakumo accused, lips turning down, brows furrowing.

"Not at the moment." The blonde said.

Sakumo crossed his arms over his broad chest, and Naruto could see the tiredness that had settled itself in the dark smudges beneath his sharp eyes. The blonde absently wondered when his heart would no longer be pained by the sight of another's suffering.

 _'Probably when I'm dead.'_ He admitted to himself. But that was true for many things. It was just the way it was.

"What game are you playing at, 'Naruto'?" The Hatake asked, tone suggesting that 'Naruto' was not his name.

"No game." Naruto assured him softly. "I was waiting for you."

"For me?" Sakumo queried, brows furrowing even further. "Whatever for?"

"To clearly thank you. However long ago it was that we talked, I was in a strange mood." The blonde explained. "So I'm telling you clearly now, thank you for helping me."

 _'Thank you, but when I leave I will sleep.'_

"What are you still doing here?" Sakumo murmured, gray orbs narrowing, sweeping over Naruto's sitting form. "No one has seemed to noticed, but you are quite capable of leaving, and their efforts to get information from you have frankly failed. So… I want to know why."

"I told you why." Naruto answered. "I was waiting for you. Now that I've seen you, I don't see any reason to stay. I wasn't sure if I could find you if I simply left."

Naruto hadn't wanted to deal with that. He knew if he waited that eventually Sakumo would come to him. Now that he didn't have to hunt people down, he wasn't going to.

"I see." Sakumo said. "And do you think I will just allow you to leave?"

"Do you think you could stop me if I really wanted to?" The blonde returned.

He was genuinely curious, but honestly Naruto wasn't looking for a fight. He'd already told himself that he was going to be passive so he could peacefully leave the village after all was said and done and pursue his much desired rest.

"If you have no hidden objective as you insinuate, then why would you react with violence if I tried to keep you here?" The Hatake asked.

"Wouldn't anyone react that way if they were being imprisoned for no good reason?"

"You are quite good at answering everything exactly the way that you want to." Sakumo said, uncrossing his arms and standing up a little straighter.

"I'm too old to play word games." Naruto informed him. "I'm too old to play any games. I simply wanted you to know that I'm grateful to you, but I won't stay here any longer than I have to. I have no ill intent towards anyone, so being kept here is unnecessary."

Silence swelled between the men again. And Sakumo looked at Naruto as if he wanted to believe his words, wanted believe he held no ill will and simply wanted to leave quietly.

Naruto had noticed that about the other man. He'd noticed even when he was distant with a fog of insanity over his brain. Sakumo looked at Naruto as if he wanted many things.

"They thought that I would be able to get you to talk. Since you made no move to hurt me in the short time that we interacted with one another." Sakumo finally said, seemingly glossing over Naruto's previous remarks. "But it appears that you will be no more forthcoming with me than you've been with them."

"Any knowledge that I have is useless to you." Naruto responded. "I just want to leave now. Honestly, I can leave because you've let me out, or I can leave in a less favorable way."

"I see." Sakumo said again. "I will get the Hokage then. Physical torture would be extreme, regardless of the times. You haven't been hostile, so I think the only one qualified to decide your fate, would be him."

Naruto didn't dignify that with a response. Regardless to what the Hokage had to say about anything, Naruto would be leaving soon. He could leave whenever he wanted, but again, he was just so tired. He wasn't going to do anything rash if he didn't have to.

Sakumo reached behind him, knocking twice quite loudly against the door that he stood before. He then stepped forward as it swung open, avoiding being struck by it.

"Can I ask you something else?" Sakumo inquired.

Naruto studied him expectantly. The silver haired man took that as confirmation.

"Why are you a man now?" Sakumo wondered.

Naruto's head tilted ever so slightly.

"Would you have been comfortable with seeing me as a woman or a child in here?"

For a split second the blonde saw absolute surprise flash in the Hatake's eyes. Naruto saw exactly when Sakumo understood his words. He knew what Naruto meant. He knew that Naruto had shifted for his peace of mind alone.

"You… you are quite strange, Naruto-san." Sakumo muttered.

It had been said before. Naruto was sure that there was quite a bit of truth in those words. After a long few moments, Sakumo stepped back a few times, backing out of the door and into the dark hallway beyond Naruto's cell.

"Will you still be here when I return?" The Hatake asked.

Naruto inclined his head.

"I'm in no rush." He told him.

And he wasn't, because how could he be with those dark eyes looking at him? Looking at him again as if there was something that their owner needed. But even still, Naruto would be leaving eventually. He would leave when that strange light in Sakumo's eyes disappeared. The blonde had seen it when he'd woken up in the hospital, after the man had calmed him in his child form from his panic attack.

Sakumo looked at Naruto in a searching way, because he needed something of him, had seen something in the blonde that he craved and was constantly looking for it to reassure himself. That was why Naruto had been so patient within his cell, not simply because he wanted to clearly thank the man again.

He'd needed to see Sakumo. He needed to soothe what that look in the man's eyes was. The look that had not disappeared even when the Anbu had seized Naruto to drag him away and put him in the cell that he was currently in. The look that he had been trying to hide as he questioned Naruto, and the look that he could see even as the door swung shut.

Naruto sat back against the wall, waiting once more for Sakumo to return, but this time, with the Hokage.

 _'I wonder what the Sandaime looks like?'_ Naruto mused. _'I've forgotten.'_

Naruto wondered how his shattered remains would handle encountering someone beloved from his muddled past.

Well, he'd know soon.

* * *

 **Ah, this was very short, I'm sorry for that. Hopefully it wasn't boring.**


End file.
